I know a place: Yoshiko Hariu

Yoshiko Hariu is the co-founder of Spark Studios, which specialises in cooking classes for children

My business partner Virginia Ngai and I founded Spark Studios this year. The idea was to give children a convenient, private place to unleash their creativity and improve their English while learning how to cook. We want to teach children a skill that will be useful to them later in life.

I never received any professional culinary training. I learned to cook from my mother and grandmother. Food is their passion, and that has been passed on to me.

The biggest challenge in teaching kids cooking is to get them to focus, listen and be patient.

To achieve this, we limit our class size to between four and eight students. I usually start off baking banana bread, blueberry muffins or oatmeal raisin cookies.

Once they are more confident, we move on to preparing carbonara pasta. Cooking is a good way to teach children time management.

When I eat out, I look for good food with decent service. The Island Shangri- La Hotel has two restaurants I often go to.

For Chinese food, steamed grouper and crispy fried chicken at the Summer Palace (5/F Island Shangri- La, 88 Queensway, Admiralty, tel: 2820 8552) are my must-have items. I also love lobster tartare on cucumber with lemon yoghurt dressing and onion soup at the Lobster Bar & Grill (6/F Island Shangri-La, tel: 2820 8560).

At the Shanghai Fraternity Association (1/F-3/F South China Building, 1Wyndham Street, Central, tel: 2524 9246) smoked eggs and vegetarian goose bean curd skin rolls are my favourites. Another Cantonese institution, Sang Kee Restaurant (2/F-3/F, 107-115 Hennessy Road, Wan Chai, tel: 2575 2239) has tasty lotus root patties and saltbaked chicken.

It is quite hard to find spacious eateries in Hong Kong where children can have fun. Dan Ryan’s Chicago Grill (112 Pacific Place, 88 Queensway, Admiralty, tel: 2845 4600) is childfriendly. They provide crayons for kids to draw while they wait.

Top Deck (Jumbo Kingdom, Shum Wan Pier Drive, Wong Chuk Hang, Aberdeen, tel: 2552 3331) has a great play area for children and a huge alfresco dining area. The menu has some fun names such as “pirate bounty” (mac and cheese) or “battle ship” (hotdog and fries).

At the Crystal Lotus at the Disneyland Hotel (Lantau, tel: 3510 6000) the dim sum resembles characters from the movies, such as the Three Little Pigs.

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